Suz and Jane and Lorraine have had some interesting thoughts about privacy and blogging about adoption.
Lorraine decided to take some comments down because they were speculative about her granddaughters motivations, they were mostly well-meaning comments, and some very insightful ones that were offered generously from adoptees about how their own experiences might provide understanding into Lorraine’s granddaughter’s feelings. My own comment wasn’t particularly insightful but rather snarky, not directed to Lorraine, but another comment. True confession: I *personally* have never been offended when Lorraine has taken one of my comments down because well, the world can live without some of my comments well enough and sometimes they definitely exemplify my most impulsive and bolshie self instead of my contemplative and kind self.
Surprisingly, at least to me, I got v. triggered by Suz’s post. That hit home a lot more because I saw it more as particular point of view, and am quite unproud of my comment, not v. articulate, but Suz was gracious enough to answer me and it got me to thinking as things that make one uncomfortable often do. I don’t see discomfort as necessarily a bad thing, I see it as what has often been a catalyst to deeper understanding in my own life. It is a challenge, but when met often comes with clear and tangible rewards. Of course I don’t like it, but it has its purpose.
Thinking on that and the fact that I am one of a handful of people who have blogged with her mother aware that she was blogging and my mother blogging about her own experience as well, I thought that puts me in a rarefied position to weigh in on privacy issues and adoption blogging. Both my mother and I share a desire to see adoption reformed, both my mother and I agree on the fact that my adoption was totally unnecessary. My mother was not unfit, not unloving, not uninterested but rather unsupported, railroaded, and was suffering the slings and arrows of a culture that was influx, it was in California in the 1970s, but my mother was a child of the 50s, she was raised by v. religious and determined people who believed that they had found a more civilized way to live post WWII.
She certainly had a foot in the new ideas and expectations of that era but also was coming from a community so conventional that she told me all the girls in her senior class wore gold-crosses in their yearbook photos to show what good Christians they were. Even though she was but a teenager a world and culture away from how I grew-up, where even for girls virginity was seen as a kind of shameful thing. When I was a teenager that only meant no boy wanted you. I think I actually cut my mother more slack about the times and her obstacles than she does. I remember distinctly one time asking her if she couldn’t forgive herself more do to her lack of choices and her voice got real low and said, “No, no reason is good enough” which is challenging for me because her guilt leads to shame and her shame leads to me being treated as less than, not on purpose just because she does feel so bad about it. Which sucks because if my grandparents had been a bit more free-spirited none of this would have happened. I have to p.s. that with and I will not believe that had none of this ever happened that my sibs would not be born, from the beginning of time their have been step-parents and I do think her husband could have gotten over it. I have to say that for a reason that will become clear as I lay-out so arrogantly my rules for adoption blogging and privacy.
In part I am arrogant because despite some difficulties I think ultimately our experience was successful. If not always pleasant, if at times difficult, because every relationship that is intimate is at times difficult. I think it can be done with reform in mind without violating privacy of others.
So, the Joy of Adoption Blogging’s Rules:
1. No Pictures
No pictures without explicit permission. If the pictures are of your child and your child is not 21 they are not old enough to give permission. Being adopted carries a significant social stigma. Just today I flipped on the t.v. and it was Law and Order the plot: Adopted grandchild kills adoptive grandfather (Is there really such a thing as an adoptive grandfather, I mean the adoptive parents adopt, not the grandparents) his motivation: Not ever feeling like one of the family. Adoptees are suspect just because they are adoptees. As the only person I know who has for decades been aware of her adoption issues and kept quiet enough about them to not tell people who tell me “You are my best friend” I know what people who think they are “safe” say about adoptees. It is not pretty. You should never out an adoptee without their adult consent. I would imagine the same thing for natural parents. I may not say anything in real life, but I do listen hard, it does seem that adoptees bear the brunt of the stigma of being unwanted even more than the natural parents. If adoptee does not want to out themselves, respect that, they have to earn a living and I have never seen the stigma played out so hard as in the workplace, maybe datability, but mostly I have been attuned to the workplace. I am lucky, being female, men tend to have a thing for crazy-bitches.
DO NOT post recognizable face showing pictures of your adopted brat, just don’t. They can if they want to when they are old enough. Blurred out, back of the head, not googleable by employers, co-workers, mean girls, fine. Adoptees are going to have a hard enough time without their private details made as hit-getting blog fodder. And YES, I love pictures of cute kids as much as anyone. But restrain yourselves and think twice if you have a striking resemblance to your kid. Even a kid with the best of circumstances does not deserve to have the real meat of family life posted. If you just have a cutsey look at my kid in the pumpkin patch type blog, then okay, but no realness there, no intimate details, I can’t stress that enough.
2. No real names of others
This isn’t just your life, whoever you are you are part of a complex web of people, the adoptive parents, the other natural relatives and the siblings of the adoptee. The people they interact with. It is not cool for you to make their lives an open book. Avoid their names, I have never used Tomtom’s real name or real school or real town’s name. I have no right to invade his privacy that way. Nor do I have a right to invade my siblings privacy or their father’s or their mother’s or my own parents. I have struggled mightily with my step-father and his position on my place in my own family, at the same time I have never named him or where he worked or anything that anyone could identify him as. As much as I have been hurt by his behavior that doesn’t give me an excuse or a right to impact his personal life in that manner.
3. Remember It Is Your Perspective Do NOT speak for others
Our stories, and this blog is mostly focused on natural mothers and adoptees, those without cultural capital, not the adopters. Of course I realize from my adoptee perspective I am heavily centered on the adoptee experience. If you can find examples of me speaking for natural parents please email me the links or post in the comments. I try very hard to remember that I am speaking from my point of view about my own experience. Which is not my mothers, or my adoptive mothers, or my adoptive brothers or my sons. It is mine. I have been most offended and unwilling to forgive those in the blogosphere who speak for adoptees who are not adoptees. Especially those adopters and natural parents who tell me my pain is unreal, hysterical, akin to people who think they have been abducted by aliens or who are having affairs with Bigfoot. I didn’t have your experience and you do not have mine. Even if you are adopted yourself, I used to say that too! That it had no impact on me, well it did, and if I am the only one who was caused anguish that is interesting enough. I know that isn’t true because I do know others, but that is so disrespectful and so beyond the pale. I am adopted, therefore I am part of the adoptee experience, just as every adoptee and every adoptee story is. Adoptees are a primary source for the adoption experience and the fact that our biggest source of ridicule is both natural parents and adoptive parents and not outsiders is just shameful. I am disgusted that I have to fight so hard to just have the decent respect that any non-adopted person has as a birth-right, as they said in the Law and Order episode I referenced earlier to the murderous adoptee: Because for you there was no birth-right.
4. Even If You Are Given Explicit Permission
Check yourself. There was a blogger that got “eviscerated” to use Suz’s words for having pictures of her son on her blog. At the same time, every post she made about her son was about how contemptible he was, what a bad person he was and even calling her young grandchild an unpleasant brat. His profession was not even good enough for her. He was described as having a personality disorder, hello? That would be bad for employment, I cannot remember one kind thing being written about this poor man by his mother. This was a young man who was abandoned twice, his adoptive parents rejected him when he was twelve. I asked her once in the comments section what her expectation was, she answered me, I feel honestly, that he would say “I am fine, Mom, don’t worry” I mean of course that is paraphrased from my own memory, but really? That is not the way the world works, that is not why there is a whole field devoted to child development.
Babies need their mommies, that isn’t advanced math and children don’t cotton to abandonment and as far as evisceration goes, an abandoned twice child more than likely is going to have some serious problems, not because he is willful or a loser but because that is a traumatic experience that reoccurred. That is awfulness. But the mother considers herself the victim? When I read her blog she did not display any kind of nurturing or maternal feeling, which she may have and I may have missed. I saw self-centeredness, I saw self-concern and lack of empathy.
If I remember correctly, which I may not, she cut off contact because her son accused her of failing him. Um, didn’t she? As a mother of a child I did raise did I fail him? Yes, at times I did. That is kind of what parents do. Perhaps she could not see it that way because she herself was so traumatized by adoption. I can’t blame her for that, she couldn’t depersonalize it because having your baby taken from you can have such a self-esteem impact. Just guessing here, again I am not a mother who gave away her baby ever. But I am a mother who terminated a pregnancy or what feels more real to me, killed her baby. As an adoptee I found that more palatable, which per se is gross.
5. Ask Permission
One of the nice things that I did with my mom is that we would, upon writing a dodgy blog send it to each other via email and say, “I wrote this, what do you think?” If we thought it was getting too personal. My mother has made certain choices that the mainstream of society would be all nutty about, but I am not mainstream and don’t care as much but still I hide for the lack of desire to rile up people against her and she in the inverse about me. Ironically, it was never one of those blogs that got us all hot and bothered. It was the ones she thought or I thought wouldn’t that got us emailing a storm.
I am tired.
I will revisit this later. I will post me and Brad-the-bad-high-school-baseball-star-boyfriend-when I was in grade-seven-song.
OMG fucking Mullets!
I will also revisit later. Im still on my honeymoon weekend, so I will save my comments (verbal evisceration) for then.
ZOMG 80′s flashback. I have to go right now and add that to my playlist.
Yes, no identifying pictures, no names, my first rule when I used to blog.
@Linda I hope you have a fantastic honeymoon.
I am also mystified by the “evisceration” accusation. That is not how I remember it going down.
I know, apparently for a mother writing post after post about what a p.o.s. her child is, is fine because being given away we are non-human, but if you say something to her like, it is rude to put your child’s smiling face next to his humiliation and total rejection by his mother you are “eviscerating” her. Let’s never forget how unimportant the child is in this equation, it is all about the mothers, in all ways.
Unfortunately anyone who writes and blogs, with photos, with regularity about an adoptee and about the daughter of the adoptee also an adoptee and then wonders why things went wrong and appears to have no insight or to take notice of what adult adoptees say will never get my vote of respect.
I have a post about similar issues this week too. It’s so hard to figure out what is allowable and what isn’t. I don’t post pictures, use alias, and any details are put in private posts (for the most part). I try to blog from only my point of view and be nice (which can be challenging sometimes). But even still it’s hard sometimes. It’s hard to know where the line is. I think you outlined some great guidelines! Great post!
Joy, your courage inspires me!
I have been wanting to write a post like this, and kept titling it “Why Adult Adoptees Didn’t Like Your Blog” explaining what it’s like to carry the stigmas of adoption and happen upon a blog with pictures, real names, and parents disclosing the most personal of personal information as if they own the kid’s story. People want to say “oh, adoptees are just mean” and are oblivious as to how offensive their blogs come off because other parents sharing the “god, I know what that’s like” parenting angsts were validating their posts over and over again with support. I’m not just an adoptee, I’m a mom too. I understand just how frustrating parenting can be. But it bewilders me that parents so many times go way over the line to paint little children to be the most horrible of inconveniences—on the internet no less where in the future their peers can find it and read it!
However, there are parenting and AP bloggers who I do like who do post pictures (not usually with real names) that I was afraid of upsetting in the process. Not because I believe in kowtowing to other groups of people within adoption but because I really do like these people. You’ve stated your opinion eloquently and inoffensively and I’m totally going to link to it in my blog entry.
As you probably know this is one area of adoption I feel very strongly about and am glad to see being opened up for discussion so courageously.For those who believe reform won’t be achieved without the painful telling of stories I’d say get real! It appears from this distance that those who oppose reform will not be swayed by personal stories – where is the evidence? They have agendas which involve other things and it would be naive to believe otherwise or to ignore their influence. Not to stay reform is not the way to go, it has to be, but when for an individual it involves a betrayal of a relative/adoptee and bringing them more pain and hurt how is that worth it? Isn’t family more important than any reforms or move to justice in the scale of things? Others will step forward if we step back to honour our relatives and act with integrity towards them. We have no right to out others we profess to love and care for, that is if we realy do!
I always thought it was a no brainer, you shouldn’t post pics of anyone unless you have their permission and it is really uncool to write about people by their first and last legal name. That is a lawsuit waiting to happen.
And if someone asks you specifically not to blog about them, you shouldn’t.
I think for some of these ladies, it is opposite day??? That’s the only conclusion I can reach.
*She’s asked me not to blog about her. She’s asked me to leave her alone. So I’m just keep writing about her and I’m going to post her correspondence on my blog tanyway because people need to know MY truth.*
???
*And if you call me out on it, you are a baddie and angry and mean and even TWO YEARS after the fact I hold a grudge but YOU are the one with a problem*
Umm… huh…ok….what?!
It makes no sense to me.
I just can’t believe it’s been over two years and this is still being brought up. Someone needs to go to therapy and it ain’t us!
When I finally learned that I had been the subject of a blog for many years, my feelings were this: Birthmom, It’s OK to tell your story, but it’s not OK to psychoanalyze me. At one point after I became in the know about the blog, my birth mother e-mailed me to inform me that she was going to do yet another post about me. I e-mailed back and said, “OK then. Put my picture up there. If I’m going to be demonized I want to have a face to the name.” When a person is de-personalized, it is easier to stereotype them. Pictures are a defense I use to avoid being stereotyped. Also, I wanted people to see how my birthmother and I look alike, as this would further personalize me.
I have made a point to post pictures of me and my family on my blog because I want people to know who I am. I feel like I have nothing to hide, and by showing myself it is harder to stereotype me by my religion or my adopted status. I have posted pictures of my underage children, because I want to show my life and my experiences as an adoptee in the context of my real life. That’s just me. All of my children consent to the pictures I post.
My 23 year-old daughter has said to me that it’s OK with her if I write about her and show pictures, but she doesn’t want to be used as ammo for any debates about adoption. I respect that.
Hmmm, trying to say this really delicately—I agree with you Megan that posting pictures does humanize the speaker. I have often thought that the people who villainize me would be shocked to see how fluffly and gentle I appear in real life. How really kind I am capable of being, if that is not always the case, but the people in real life describe me as loving and sweet.
Perhaps you feel differently and this is the part that I am trying to be really delicate about because your aparents will not find your blog as they have passed. You also don’t seem to be as close, *my interpretation* with your asibs as I am with mine. We are different, but I know he would be upset by some of the things as I have written, and I know for a fact that my sister has been upset by some of the things I have written.
Tomtom has his own relationships with all of these people. I know, because I have expressed to him that I am concerned how his grandma my amom would feel if she knew this blog was mine, he responded that she would just have to get over it, but I don’t see it as simply as he does.
I fear that people in my life would ask him to weigh in on my opinions, which I don’t think is fair to him. I fear professional ramifications as well as personal to my radical opinions. I have a common name, which you do not, I applaud your bravery in outing yourself, but I feel that is your decision to make. Those who know me well would recognize me from my writing without a pic. I fear. Those who don’t know me well would recognize my family from my picture. Again, telling my own story that would be my right, maybe there will be a time in my life where I can feel comfortable doing that. That sounds kind of nice.
I find myself esp. incensed when I see mothers of either varietal, natural or adoptive post pictures of young children that they are meant to care for with very sensitive issues that their children are having AND (so mad I busted out caps-lock-rage) are WRITING A BOOK ABOUT IT OR IN SOME OTHER WAY TRYING TO PROFIT OFF THEIR UNDERAGE CHILD’S PAIN. I mean if an adult consents, that is one thing, a 4 year-old, 7 year-old etc. cannot.
Nope, not down with that, I would encourage you to think about posting your minor child’s pictures, Surely you can post pictures of yourself, your adult children and your life that does not include your minor children. You do seem like a lovely person, but I can glean that without your minor children’s pictures.
I don’t blog, just contribute to forums and comment occasionally. However, I always comment as if my relatives might read it one day. After all, it can’t be deleted (by me anyway) and even if they don’t come across it today, they could in 10 years time.
There was one blog post on Lorraine’s blog that was very relevant to my first mother’s situation but I didn’t feel comfortable sharing it on a public and popular blog, even without using names etc because I just worry that years in the future someone might read it and think, that sounds like so and so.
So, I very much do agree with what you are saying about privacy. Sometimes, people just can’t get that their blogging could be making things worse for their relationship, or perhaps they are beyond caring. Btw I am not talking about a specific blog here at all, just saying in general.
Good points, Joy. I’m not saying that everyone should be so public. But it works for me.
You make really, really great points, Joy. Issy has made similar great ones on her blog.
At one point when absolutely no one in my natural family would talk to me at all, and I felt like a paper towel flung to the ground after being used, if even that, I wrote a lot of sharp things. And to their credit, my family said that they could understand how I felt those things, once they came around to speaking to me. They didn’t judge me or ask me to remove my words. No censorship.
We did, however, sit down and they asked for some ground rules. Some of them didn’t want me to write about them at all. Fine. Some said that they would prefer that I not write about our conversations, and that seemed fair. Now I write about my relationships more on a more abstract level. Maybe it helps that things are better between us. I have other, more private places to go when I need emotional support or to vent. I am thankful that my family is, by and large, pretty reasonable–that is, at least the people who have an interest in me. The others, well, I am not losing sleep over them. You can’t force people to have relationships with you.
And it’s true that relationships need privacy to grow. I am sure that if my brother had a blog and was writing endless posts about how annoying his crazy-ass sister can be, I would probably be offended, on some level, even if it is a little bit true that I am off my rocker. LOL I guess I should count myself lucky that he hates the Internet and only believes in print.
My mother is like you, Joy, and refuses to have pictures of herself online. She despises the invasion of her privacy. Once I told her that I found a picture of her online in which I resemble her greatly, and she told me never again to tell her that I find such things. She doesn’t want to know. Fair enough. So I sure as hell am not going to post any pictures of her anywhere.
It’s really important to listen to what people want and what their boundaries are.
YES! YES! YES!
I know some people are thinking that the other person doesn’t want a relationship with them so they should just say whatever they want and DO whatever they want online but as you know, reunion can turn on a dime. People CAN come together even after years of denial and separation. It happens. And once something is online, it is really there forever.
I am baffled by the bloggers who are so cavalier about releasing private and/or identifying information about the other person to the internets. It crosses a great deal of boundaries that can not be uncrossed at the end of the day.
I hear you Issy. When I blogged I thought my relationship with my mother was over. Well, I guess it turned out that I was right.
Never say never, Paris.
Have you seen the latest. She is now pondering lawsuits if something said on other blogs could effect her job. Hello? That’s what I’ve been saying the reason why they shouldn’t be writing about their adoptees using their full names. THEY are going to get sued one day.
I think of Denise’s son. The poor guy got blogged about with his legal name AND got his face plastered on the top of her blog. What happens if HIS future employer had googled him and found the haterade? He could legitmately sue the pants off of her.
That was my whole point!